Sunday, June 13, 2010

crunch time!

This past week was mainly about doing the mise en place for our practice exam, struggling to finish the practice exam, doing the mise en place for restaurant service, finishing our last restaurant service, and then having a free day!

the timeline for our practice exam... we kind of fell off schedule after 11am

the moka's close-up shot. I think my "flames" (the piped border around the criss-cross design) have improved since the first time I made the moka. woo hoo for improvement!

we finished filling and glazing the éclairs/religieuses the next day

Chef checking out all of our choux

Other than our practice exam, our big thing this week was the last restaurant service for lunch. We ended with a bang, offering 6 different desserts! There was quite the assortment, with sweet treats ranging from:

Macaron framboises - a macaron filled with rose-flavored buttercream and fresh raspberries... there might have been something with litchi sorbet, but I didn't see it

Feuillantine - a chocolate biscuit base with a wafer/praline layer and topped with chocolate mousse... I think I can honestly say that this was one of my favorites of this service, if not the whole program.....

inside cut of the feuillantine

Paris-Brest en stick aux framboises - basically a Paris-Brest in long stick form with raspberries inside

Fraisier - another entremet with a biscuit on the bottom, fresh strawberries dotted inside a layer of mousseline cream (pastry cream + butter) and topped with another layer of biscuit... and fondant on top. Might be the 2nd place winner of this lunch's service.

good old traditional tiramisu

and we finish off with the one and only French tarte tatin.

The service was ok, since we didn't have to plate any of the desserts. We just left them as big pieces and gave them to the servers so they could slice and serve, as needed. In the meantime, we finally finished our practice exam by dipping our chocolate bonbons... did I mention I hate tempering chocolate? Chef seemed to be really on our backs this past week, especially when we did the chocolate... is he finally simulating what it's going to be like in our internships? The stress and stern voice? Why now? Why not from the beginning??

As we started late on Friday (13h30), it was definitely a chill relaxed day. No one really wanted to be there, including Chef. He mentioned something about doing regional desserts if we wanted, or we could just practice whatever we thought we needed to practice. I decided to take the opportunity to squeeze in some new recipes before I lose the availability of an oven (no oven at home).

Gâteau basque - a cake from Pays Basque (I think) with pastry cream in the middle...

my 2nd gâteau basque since I made two smaller ones rather than a large one. I ran out of pastry cream so I used some leftover chocolate pastry cream and green tea pastry cream, divided by some dough... made an interesting combo, to say the least.

30 minutes before we were supposed to start cleaning up, Chef told me to make a kouign-amann. Umm... yea, I don't think he realized what time it was. The kouign-amann was supposed to sit for 30 min, before I did a couple turns to it... letting it rest for 30 min. between each turn... and rest for 45 more min before I baked it. Well, we actually finished it within an hour, and let it rest in the warming oven before baking it. Turns out the warmth melted all the butter (and there was a lot of butter) so the dough was sitting in a pool of butter when we baked it.... despite its presentation, it still turned out really well. So good and buttery!!! *note: don't eat too much otherwise you're going to get sooo sick... not that I would know or anything ;) *

2 of my kouign-amanns turned out, while the other two had some separation-anxiety issues from the pan...

Still can't believe that this next week is our final exam. eeeekkk! Time to go and practice some piping...